


Indian Ocean. Present Day.

by Jay Tryfanstone (tryfanstone)



Category: Top Gun (1986)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, M/M, Yuletide 2016, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 23:24:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 16,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8943616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryfanstone/pseuds/Jay%20Tryfanstone
Summary: Isolated on an aircraft carrier in the middle of the Indian Ocean, cut off from any source of information about the global political and environmental disaster which has engulfed the planet, Maverick and Goose struggle to make sense of an increasingly claustrophobic command structure and failing resources on board. When a refugee helicopter is spotted approaching the carrier, its pilot could be the catalyst for an explosive re-evaluation....





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kayim](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kayim/gifts).



> The major character death is canonical.

Sunrise. Light was a line of gold on the horizon, a luminal outlining of the soft, slow swell of the sea. Above the aircraft carrier's radio masts, a single seagull cried out, its harsh voice cutting through the hum of auxiliary engines and the muffled throb of rhythmic music. The carrier rode the sea without a single riding light, but fifty feet above the dark glimmer of her flight deck, the windows in her executive offices burned bright with the extravagance of unlimited power. 

The carrier's nuclear power plant could power her, unsupported, for twenty years. Launched in the early years of the millennium, she was equipped for cyber warfare and subatomic threat. Her communications array was precise to a laser point, capable of isolating a cell phone conversation half a world away or picking a single key word from a million terabytes of data. Her weaponized ability encompassed unmanned sea and air defence drones, surface to air and surface to surface missiles, torpedos and the capacity for nuclear weapons. Together with the seventy F/A-18E and ten F/A-18F Super Hornets of the flight deck, she carried four combat ready Blackhawk helicopters. She had, when fully crewed, a compliment of 6,000 staff. Fully stocked, her freezers and storage bays could feed her crew for 70 days before resupply. Within the armored steel plates of her hull, the great hall of her main concourse encompassed six recreation rooms, four franchised fast food outlets, a Starbucks, a dentist, two barbers, and an internal store that could supply everything from tank turrets to toilet paper. 

She was a city in miniature, and partaking of the quality of cities, her steel decks encompassed both an enforced and inescapable lack of privacy and an overpowering solitude.

At dawn, at the tipping curve of the flight deck, fighter pilot Lieutenant Pete "Maverick" Mitchell was seeking that solitude. Testimony to the carrier's exceptional deployment, the decking under his boots was scuffed and scored. Paint peeled from the cold steel of the railing, a rough swell of rust bubbling under layers of Navy whitewash. Flakes, spinning into the sea, were briefly struck to gold by the sunrise: the silver wings on Maverick's flight suit shimmered above the shadows and pinpricks where his squadron badges had once been sewn. 

Ahead, the carrier's bow plunged towards a shadowed sky. The towering clouds were lined with light, the sea, dark under their weight, glimmered in the dawn. The ocean was empty. The carrier sailed alone, shorn of her usual supporting supply ships and destroyer escort. It was the forty-fifth day they had been at sea without resupply.

Hidden by the bulk of his overalls, Maverick was holding the only wireless enabled device he and Goose had managed to retain; a tablet that bore little resemblance to the child's gift it was once going to be. Goose wrote the software. Maverick tested it. He was trying and failing, as he had tried and failed at unpredictable intervals over the last six weeks, to bypass the carrier's signal jamming protocols without being discovered.

Today was not that day. Tomorrow could be. Maverick slid the tablet into his breast pocket, forcing his anger through the grip of his hands into the steel of the ship, tuning his face into the wind. On the carrier, the privacy of the flight deck at dawn was the closest he could get to the freedom of an open road and the power of his bike between his thighs. 

His peace was brief. Above Maverick's head, one of the officers partying in the offices had opened a window. Sound, music, electric with rage, slammed into the morning. The singer's voice was backed by a bass beat so heavy the deck seemed to throb in sympathy. "White America," he sang. "White America-" The dense, leaf-sweet smell of a lit cigar wafted across the rails. 

"Hell," Maverick muttered to himself. He thrust his chilled hands into his pockets. Inside, he'd find hot coffee and pancakes, artificial maple syrup and a butter substitute that melted so sweetly it might as well be the real thing. There would be feature films in two of the cinemas and soft porn in the third, an endless recycling of Playboy blondes in miniscule bikinis. He could turf his decimated, patched together squadron out of their racks and start up a game of craps, a scratch basketball team, a chess club.

"Hey, Mav!"

"Brock," Maverick acknowledged. 

"What's up? Early for you flyboys, ain't it?" Brock was flight crew, one of the mechanics who kept the planes functional, his overalls stained with oil and his fingers notched with the small scars of unceasing maintenance.

"Thought I'd get an early start," Maverick said. 

"Right," said Brock, shrugging. 

Someone closed the window. The words of the song were gone.

Brock jerked his head at the superstructure. "Dude, those guys sure know how to throw a party." Rueful admiration tinged his voice. 

"Yeah," said Maverick. 

"Scuttlebutt says pilots get VIP passes," Brock said. He waited. "Because, if you ever wanted to trade..."

"I hear you," Maverick said. He balled his fists in his pockets. 

"Cannot confirm or deny, huh?" Brock said. "Man, I tell you, those girls-"

The music cut out. 

A heartbeat later, the air attack warning wailed into the silence. Over the rise and fall of the siren, scratched with static, the Captain's voice said, "All stations. All stations. We are under attack. This is not a drill. Repeat. This is not a drill." A second later, "Who turned that noise on, I can't hear my own voice." And, louder, "Defend the ship! Remember New York!" 

The siren stopped. His last word rang out across the deck. 

"Well," muttered Brock, turning to the stairs down to the hangers. "See you on the other side." 

The clouded sky hid any approaching aircraft. Maverick, surveying it, squinted into the rising sun. Behind him, men ran to the anti-aircraft guns, struggling into flak jackets and cotton gloves. Hydraulics whined as the guns lifted. The seagulls, disturbed, wheeled and called above the deck. The loudspeakers were silent. 

He could hear it before he saw it, the heavy whine of a helicopter, steady and getting louder.

"Hold fire." It was the XO's voice on the loudspeaker. There was noise behind him, a confused echo of voices and the rising tone of an argument.

Maverick leaned forward on the rail. Descending below the cloud base, only a hundred feet above the waves, the helicopter was a pin-pick of a silhouette. Then a cardboard cutout. Finally, as the pilot dipped its nose, it revealed itself as a Russian-built Mi-8, a military transport with a hundred variants. It was flying slowly, low over the ocean and taking no evasive maneuvers, as obvious as a LCAC in a duck pond. 

It was the first aircraft, other than those attached to the ship, he'd seen for five weeks.

"What did you say?" said the Captain, very clearly, over the loudspeaker. "Radio contact? Friendly? Friendly what?"

The helicopter began weaving from side to side in long, wide curves, a skillful, tightly-controlled display that verged on aeronautics, as far from an attacking position as a Labrador with a Frisbee.

"Hold fire. Maintain position. Helicopter has permission to offload."

"Not on my deck!" shouted the Captain. "Hold the line!"

"Helicopter will not land," said the XO. "Repeat. Helicopter does not have permission to land."

"What the _hell_ ," Maverick said. "What the actual, freaking-" He was running towards the landing zone, watching the helicopter turn and ride the air above the waves, parallel to the ship. The doors were open, revealing a group of people, a woman - kids. There were kids in that helicopter.

He found himself shouting. Armed marines were forming up around the zone, taking cover behind the turrets. "There are kids in there!"

"You heard what the man said!" roared a familiar voice. Maverick's immediate commanding officer, Commander Mike "Viper" Metcalf, was in the firing zone. "Offload is permitted. Do not, repeat, do not fire unless fired upon. Johnson, see the man down. Sergeant, get your marines out of the LZ yesterday, do you hear me?"

"Helicopter does not have permission to land," repeated the XO.

The helicopter swung in over the deck, low enough that Maverick could see the pilot, a white shirt, a shock of blond hair above dark sunglasses. 

Kazansky. 

_Iceman_.

Maverick's fellow USAAF pilot was watching the waves, timing the helicopter's hover to the heave and roll of the ship, and doing it brilliantly. Fingers were crowding the cabin door, women and children, their imbalanced weight just another hazard in a world of them. Kazansky's skids were six feet above the deck, five, two....

Maverick was holding his breath. 

Two feet above the deck, the helicopter held steady against the crosswind in a breathtaking display of virtuoso skill. A boy, a teenager, leapt from the cabin. He turned, reaching up for a woman in a dress the color of the sunrise, catching her as she jumped. There was another woman after her, and then a little girl, and two more boys, and finally as the deck rose and the helicopter rolled with it a woman was tumbling onto the deck, a woman, clutching a baby. Marines had already broken formation. It was Sergeant Ruiz who reached out to break the woman's fall. Other marines were hustling the kids away from the wash of the rotor blades, heads bent, running. One of them was carrying the little girl, his hand protectively over her head. 

The helicopter lifted, spinning out to port, the leeward side of the ship. As Maverick watched, Kazansky opened his door and looked down at the waves. The rotors, with their tremendous uplift, flattened the sea. Spindrift blew across the deck. "He's going to ditch," Maverick said, incredulous.

"One hell of a thing," said Goose, panting, at his side.

"One hell of a pilot," said Maverick. 

"Marines!" roared the Commander. "Man the nets! That's Lieutenant Kazansky in that helicopter, and I want him on this ship!"

The loudspeaker crackled, and was abruptly switched off. Kazansky was taking off his helmet, tucking his sunglasses into his shirt pocket. Marines were lining the side of the ship, unrolling the great rope mats of the boarding nets and heaving them over the side. 

"There's no time," Goose said. "He won't make it."

"They'll slow the carrier down," Maverick said. Anything else was murder. "Even if they're making him ditch. They have to." He could see the fierce concentration on Kazansky's face as he brought the helicopter down, lower, almost touching the waves. Anything could flip the machine into the sea. A minute sheer on the controls, the slightest contact of a rotor blade to the sea, a rogue wave. Kazansky had to get the angle right, roll the helicopter so the lethal blades fell away from the ship, allow himself time to exit the cabin.

The carrier was not slowing. "Get those ropes!" Maverick said. There were coils at the rails, left after the third time the hanger lifts had failed and they'd had to tie the planes down on the deck. 

Waves were breaking over the helicopter's skids. It was still keeping pace with the ship, holding steady against the battering local updrafts. 

Years ago, in a different country, Maverick had pitched. Now he hefted the rope in his hands, weighing the length of the throw, as Goose stood braced by the rail with the trailing end.

Thirty feet away, Kazansky looked up from the control panel. He was smiling. He saluted. And with a single touch on the controls, as the helicopter rolled away from the carrier, stately as a whale, as Kazansky stepped out of the cabin and dived into the sea - the rotors hit. The sea exploded, water sheeting upwards in great white waves, the helicopter imploding. 

"Where the hell," Maverick yelled. "Get him. _Get him_!" 

Beyond the crash zone, a blond head broke the water. Maverick was running down the deck, rope in his hands. Marines were frantically rolling out more nets. Kazansky was swimming, head down, splashy and powerful, as the carrier swept past him. "Iceman!" Maverick shouted, and let the rope fly out.


	2. Chapter 2

The flight crew on a carrier generally shared a suite of rooms on the lower deck, clustered under the superstructure and near to the officer's quarters, but with only six pilots, their flight engineers, and twenty hard-pressed support crew they'd spread out. Maverick and Goose had a cabin apiece, next door to each other, furthest from the pilot's mess but closer to the flight deck. In defiance of regulations unenforced since Oman, Maverick had printouts of every plane he'd ever piloted and every bike he'd ever owned pinned up on his walls, punctuated by Ducati schematics and playboy centerfolds. Goose had pictures of his family. They both had far more towels, soap and shower accoutrements than regulation allowed, which was why Kazansky was sitting on Goose's rack with a purple bath sheet wrapped around his waist, drinking a mug of Goose's hoarded filter coffee. There was a half-empty bottle of brandy on the floor by his feet. 

Kazansky had very pale toes, broad and flat, his bones round-knuckled under his skin. His ankles and calves were thick with muscle, the strong dark hairs on his legs belying his blonde hair. He looked exhausted. Worn thin, the curve of his collarbones above his dog tags and his ribs were sharply pronounced, his face hollowed out, the high bones of his cheekbones sharp against his skin and his eyes sunken. His California tan was a faded memory. But his feet were firmly on the deck and his hands steady, and there was strength in the muscles of his thighs and shoulders, the efficiency of a perfectly trained, perfectly tuned machine.

Nudity was a given, a staple of shared locker rooms and showers and ignored by unspoken, ironclad rules, but there was something appealing in that confident, sure-of-itself exposure. It shook Maverick, reminded him of the world beyond the carrier's insulated decks. 

Outside the cabin door, the loudspeaker in the corridor gave a double-click. Maverick had been staring. He said, "Kazansky." 

"Maverick," said Kazansky. He snatched the towel from his hair and glared upwards. "Even here."

"Still the same old Iceman," Maverick said. His voice sounded thin. He shook his head, stuck his hand out. "Good to see you, man."

"You too," Kazansky said. 

His handshake, reassuringly, gave no quarter. Maverick found himself smiling. "Debrief done?" 

"Yup." Kazansky balled up the towel and threw it, hard, at the cardboard box in the corner where Goose dumped his laundry. His mouth was set, a hard line.

"Well, shit," said Maverick. He huffed out a breath. "Guess they gotta be sure." Goose was using the second bunk as a couch. There were cushions, evidence of his flight engineer's nostalgia for domesticity, belied by the cabin's steel grey paintwork. Maverick sat. "So. What the hell," he said, "What the absolute living hell is going on out there, Ice?"

Kazansky stared back at him. "That's classified," he said.

"Bullshit," said Maverick.

Kazansky was still staring at him. There was a message in the tilt of his chin Maverick couldn't read. "What?" he said. "What?"

"Our commander in chief," Kazansky said, "Asked if I had Forbes. He has an interview due out this month, excellent journalist, do I know her?" His hands described a remarkable pair of breasts and then slammed the image from the air. "I haven't seen a magazine for two months."

"And that's why we serve," Maverick said. He leaned forward, speaking quietly, distinctly, the trained calm of an emergency broadcast. "Goose and I were over the Fulda Gap with the 23rd. We had a couple of tankers up there when Germany blew up, couldn't raise the AWACS, went south. Dropped two of the guys off at one of the Israeli bases. Operator there said Egypt was red hot, so we headed down the Gulf." Maverick was speaking faster now, lower. "Kuwait was fucked. RAF Oman said they still had a runway, so we went down there. Sixteen hours. Sixteen hours flight time. We had to hold while they got Air Force One down. We lost one of the tankers." Maverick's hands were clenched on the side of the rack. "Then we lost everyone. Essential staff only on the helicopters. Fuck, Ice, we left - we left the 5th Marines, they'd hoofed it in from Kuwait, we left the SEALS, we left these Brit Special Forces guys. We lost Jacob and Beetle, they couldn't get 398 off the ground..."

"I hear you," Kazansky said. 

"We got Charlie and Frankfurter, Neilsy, Doggo and Mad Max in from Hungnam. We got a couple of guys from the Nimitz, they were in the air when the shit hit the fan. We got Potato, he used to fly A-10s. And then - ah, fuck, Ice, the fuckers on board started shooting us out of the sky," Maverick said. "It'll say MiGs on the live kills board, but I know a fucking F-16 on my radar when I see it. They've jammed comms. Nothing in or out. I got no idea if anyone else made it. Goose ain't heard jack shit."

The loudspeaker in the corridor clicked again, notice of another failed transmission from the Captain. There were always issues with the wiring. They'd had the cover off three times. 

Maverick didn't wince. 

Kazansky looked at him. "I'm not the fucking cavalry," he said. 

"I hear you're a very nice man," said Goose, from the doorway. "Excellent pilot. Exclamation mark. I would never have guessed."

Kazansky snorted. He said, "I am the best pilot in the United States Navy." 

Goose kicked Maverick's ankle. "What?" said Maverick. 

Goose kicked him again. 

"Oh, yes. Yeah? I - no, we, definitely we - _we_ are the best fighter crew the Navy has ever seen," Maverick said. The words felt tired.

"Given that the United States Navy currently consists of-" Kazansky cut himself off. "Did Merlin make it?"

"No," said Maverick. He had to look away. He swallowed. 

Goose said, "So - that's - that's - really? We're it?"

Kazansky stared at him, very level. "The XO was very clear on the classified nature of data external to the carrier's mission," he said.

"Bullshit. There were supposed to be-" Goose glanced into the corridor, cutting himself off. "Hey, Ross! What was that new form for requisitions called, the one for clothing? P-something? 548? Yeah, got it, thanks." He turned back, eyebrows waggling. "Get you squared away in no time," he said, loudly, and drew a finger across his throat. 

Glancing at the open doorway and the corridor behind, Kazansky nodded sharply. 

"Shit," Maverick whispered. "Shit, shit..." He slammed upright, took three sharp steps to the back wall and back. 

"Here you go, fill this out," Goose said. "Lemme find you a pen." But the paper he handed over was torn from the notebook by his bed.

Kazansky wrote, 'Flew in from Diego. No comms this month. Internet down. Chain of command compromised.'

Goose snatched the pencil back. 'Los Angeles?' he wrote.

Kazansky looked at him. 'Your wife?' Then he wrote, 'I don't know.' He hesitated. 'I'm sorry.'

Paling, Goose felt for the door frame and gripped onto it. Then his knees went: Kazansky was looking away. In two steps, Maverick was pushing Goose down on the couch, snapping his fingers for the brandy. There was no spare glass. Goose upended the bottle.

"Everything okay in here?"

"Bill, isn't it?" Kazansky was standing up, smiling his cold, shark smile, hiding Goose from view. "Bill Ross. I haven't seen you since Kandahar. Good to meet you." He was shaking Ross's hand, sharply definitive. "You finally got those stripes."

"Major Ross," Ross said stiffly. "Lieutenant." He was in full uniform.

"That's Colonel Iceman to you," said Kazansky. "Promotion was expedited. We were just celebrating. Shot?"

"I don't know what protocol you followed in your last posting, but this is a dry ship," Ross snapped. "On this occasion, under the circumstances, I'm inclined to be lenient-"

"That's a first," Maverick muttered.

Ross' hand clenched. "But don't let me find you indulging again. I'll take that bottle, lieutenant."

There were two inches left in the bottle. Chin up, eyes hard, Maverick tipped his head back and drank half, then passed the bottle to Kazansky. Swallowing the last of the brandy, Kazansky was still watching Ross, his eyes a dark line under the pale blonde of his eyelashes. 

Maverick had got Goose on his feet. "Clothes by the couch, Colonel," he said. "You wanna eat? I wanna eat. Goose wants to eat." He added, so emphatic the tone was a statement in itself, "Sir."

When Kazansky thrust the bottle at him, Ross took it, opened his mouth, and said nothing. Tapped the bottle against the doorframe. Then he said, satring at Goose, "Get this damn loudspeaker fixed, Bradshaw. Call yourself a flight engineer."

Goose stared at Ross's retreating back, glassy-eyed. Maverick had clapped one hand over Goose's mouth. With the other, he was giving Ross the bird.

With so few flight crew, the pilot's mess was down to three meals a day and only a couple of choices, but they were open twelve hours a day and a reliable source of over brewed weak coffee the rest of the time. The chairs were plastic, the tables were bolted to the floor, and the cutlery was that cheap nickel-plated steel that stained as if the metal had been dipped in acetate, but the food was hot and plentiful. 

"Hey!" Maverick shouted over the counter. "Hey, Dewayne!" 

The steward who came out from the kitchen was a white man, with a little pencil moustache and a dishcloth twisted in his hands. "No food," he said. "Sorry. No food. Only on shift."

"Where's Dewayne?" asked Maverick.

"Food on shift," said the steward. 

"I know you've got something back there," Maverick said. "Couple of hash browns. Omelets. Come on, we're starving."

"No eggs," said the steward. "Food at shift."

"That's another hour!" said Maverick.

"Mav," said Goose.

"And where's-"

"Mav," Goose said. 

The vending machines yielded a packet of skittles and a box of Hostess Cakes, a month out of date. Dewayne had been reassigned to the cleaning crew. No, he was working. No, he would still be working if they came back later. The supervisor couldn't say, sir, the cleaning schedules being the responsibility of the exec. 

"Ah, hell," said Maverick. "Best steward we ever had, and they've got him cleaning the heads."

"I mean," said Goose, very quietly, still a little green, hunkered down behind A turret with a half-eaten Hostess Cake in his hand, "There's FUBAR and then there's FUBAR, you know what I'm saying?"

"I hear you," said Kazansky.

"We're running on fumes," Maverick said. "Twenty minute flight-time. Half the systems are down - the exec keep tinking with the specs. We got thirty two different kinds of shampoo and no relays on board. Don't let them give you 339. Undercarriage seized up half a mile out. Texas and Hitman had to do a hard reboot to get it down. And don't talk in the briefing room. It's bugged."

Kazansky nodded. He was staring at the clouds. In the evening, they gathered over the sea, heavy and dark, thunderous swelling plumes shadowing the sea. The evening wind was strong enough to sweep his hair back from his forehead, his familiar crew cut grown out into a college kid's floppy bangs.

It wasn't the first time either of them had served on the Indian Ocean. Maverick remembered sunsets painting a clear sky. Stars. Sleeping out on the deck. Heat. He said, "We haven't had internet since we left Germany. And the carrier lost the satellite link up a week ago. Or that's what they tell us."

"Yeah?" said Kazansky.

"We're told GPS is down," Maverick said. "We don't - Goose and I are trying, but - we don't know-" It was excruciating to admit it. He swallowed the words. "I don't know where we are. But we're sure as hell still flying. Two planes in the air. Twelve CAP patrols a day. Briefings down to fifteen minutes. No deviation from route plan. Fire on sight."

"Wall of steel," Goose quoted. He crumbled the cake in his fingers. A seagull, gliding above the port flight deck, cocked a baleful eye. 

"Yeah," said Maverick. "Finger on the trigger twenty four seven and we haven't seen another plane out here for five weeks."

"Except that last MiG," Goose said.

Maverick said, "Ross got a congressional medal out of that one. Self reported. Red alert for four days."

Goose tossed the crumbs into the ocean. Kazansky pushed at the bridge of his sunglasses. "Think, Maverick," he said. He reached out, closed his hand around Maverick's bicep, and stared at him. "Think."

Maverick might not like Kazansky, but he trusted him. They were on the same side. "What? What, Ice?"

Kazansky didn't answer.

"Classified," said Goose. "Iceman won't break his oath, Mav."

"You flew straight towards us," Maverick said slowly. "You've a range of, what, two hundred ten miles with the Mi-8, and you've got kids on board. Millions of square miles of ocean and you fly straight towards us."

Kazansky's mouth curled at the corner. He nodded.

"There's someone else out there," Maverick said.

On deck, the loudspeaker crackled. "Keep our country safe!" The XO said. "Support our brave troops! Absolute loyalty! Report suspicious behavior! Remember - vigilance saves lives!"

Goose scored a direct hit on the speaker with a crumpled cake wrapper.


	3. Chapter 3

"Talk to me, Goose," Maverick muttered.

The loudspeaker on deck declaimed, "Our brave pilots taking off for a vital mission! Safeguarding our nation and our Commander in Chief!"

"He's going to ask for a round of applause," Goose muttered.

"A round of applause!" the speaker demanded.

Ross was the flight deck commander today. Maverick put his hands together.

"And go! Go!" the speaker demanded. "Watch those planes go!"

Goose said urgently, "I don't have the emergency beacon." He flipped the switch. "Control, this is Goose. I don't have XACAS. Copy?"

"Clear copy," Viper said over the radio. "XACAS is non-functional. Repeat, XACAS is non functional. I'll take confirmation from each of you gentlemen. Confirm."

Maverick overrode the control channel. "What the fuck," he said. He looked up at the canopy. Even under a clouded sky, Goose's reflection looked back at him. "What the actual fuck."

Kazansky's voice said, very steady, "Confirm."

"Mav," Goose said.

Maverick flipped the switch. "Confirm," he told control, and moved forward to the catapult that would propel himself and Goose along the runway.

Six weeks after their last, chaotic resupply in Oman, the carrier's flight capacity was down to six functional F/A-18s, four single seaters and two Super Hornets with the capacity for pilot and weapons officer. Two of them were on dawn patrol, enough fuel in the tanks for twenty minutes, no more, a pre-set course uploaded to the navigation system. They were the carrier's first defense, the Captain said, a wall of steel. The world's most advanced combat aircraft, the guardians of a free United States.

Whatever was left of it.

Without the emergency beacon, if the plane lost both engines, or fell into an irreversible spin or had to ditch, if the patched-together control systems glitched or the cannibalized spare parts failed, there would be no rescue. Their course was known, but without the beacon providing an accurate location, no rescue helicopter or inflatable would be able to find them. 

ACAS depended on a satellite link-up.

"Goose." 

"Yeah, I know," Goose said. "We've been losing nav systems as fast as they can hack them."

"Anything we can do?"

"You just fly the plane," Goose said. " _I've_ got a couple of sub routes going they haven't found yet. I've got a position." He paused. "Within a couple of hundred miles."

"That's great," Maverick said. "Thanks."

"I hate it when you say that," Goose said.

"I don't want my flight crew to feel underappreciated," Maverick said. 

"Crew?" said Goose. "Crew? Really? That's the best you can-"

"Maverick, this is Iceman. Copy?" Kazansky was speaking quickly. Something had happened. 

"Copy, Iceman," Maverick said.

"I've got a ship down here," Kazansky said. "Some kind of trawler."

"Iceman, this is control," Viper said. "Can you identify for me? Any sign of life?"

Kazansky said, "No. Maverick, it's at your three, five miles out."

"Got it," said Maverick. It was a smudge on the horizon. He angled towards it, nose down, slowing. 

"You're within the exclusion zone, gentlemen," Viper warned. 

"Circling at two thousand feet," said Kazansky.

"Movement?"

"No." 

Maverick said, "I've got fuel for six minutes."

"Good to know you can still add up, Maverick," Kazansky said. "I'm sure Goose is reassured."

Viper said, "Iceman. Report."

"No movement," said Kazansky. "You got visual?"

"Confirm," said Viper. There was something about his voice, a note of strain uncharacteristic of their immediate commander.

"Five minutes," Goose said, off comms.

The radio exploded. "What the hell?" someone shouted, so loudly static blurred his voce. 

"Sir, you're live," Viper said. His voice was staccato, short, snapping at the words.

"Attack!" the Captain shouted. "Blow it up!"

Maverick, climbing, said, "No movement at two hundred feet. Vessel appears abandoned." He could see Kazansky above him, rolled into a climb, and leveled out to fly in parallel. He was close enough to see Kazansky raise his hand in a swift salute. 

"Vessel appears deserted, sir," Viper said. 

"This is your commander in chief speaking," said the Captain said. "I am ordering you to destroy that clear and present danger. Destroy it! You hear me?"

"Gentlemen," Viper said.

"Maverick," Kazansky said.

He'd taken off first. There was less fuel in his tanks. "Peeling off," Maverick said. "On approach. Switching to missiles. Armed."

The boat wallowed, its wooden superstructure bleached white, the white paint of its hull stained with rust. At a mile out, the F/18's onboard camera showed half the windows in the cabin blown out, probably by one of the frequent tropical storms. The deck was scattered with debris, and what looked like heaps of dirty fabric.

"Fishing nets," said Maverick. They were neatly coiled, as if someone hoped to return to them. Someone who could be sleeping below decks, exhausted by battling with the night's high winds. 

"Hey, you know," Goose said, "There could be..."

"Yeah, I know," said Maverick. 

Against incoherent background voices, Viper said, "Gentlemen, you are within the United States Government exclusion zone. That is a hostile vessel. Commence fire."

Something moved in the deckhouse, a flicker of white. Maverick could hear Goose's indrawn breath. 

"Sir," Maverick said. "Sir, there may be someone alive in there." He was sweating. His wrist cramped, a sudden, vicious ache. 

"Fire!" screamed the Captain.

He had twenty seconds. 

"I can't take the shot," Maverick said. "Missiles non functioning. Switching to guns." He was already almost over the boat. He fired. 

The F-18's two 20mm cannons tore a double row of bullet holes up the deck, splintering wood, puncturing steel, ripping open the nets until they danced as if they were alive. Maverick did not see the damage. He was watching the untouched wheelhouse flash past, where that flicker of white had shown in the window.

If anything lived in there, they were still alive. 

"Colonel," Viper said, an order.

Kazansky said, "Diving. Missiles armed. I've got my finger on the trigger. Gonna get that bastard. Come on. Come on. Yeah, let them have it. On target. On target..."

A Harpoon missile carries 221 kilograms of penetration high-explosive. The boat, and anything it carried, evaporated. Maverick, holding at five thousand feet, had a ringside view of the fireball, and the mushrooming smoke. 

Kazansky said, "Target attained. Mission successful."

Viper said, "Copy. Congratulations, gentleman. Come on home." 

Two minutes out, Kazansky said, plane to plane, "It was a sheet. Must have been tacked onto the window."

Maverick said, "Copy, Iceman."

Kazansky got a medal. It was a flight deck presentation minutes after landing. Kazansky was still in his flight overalls, the Captain, flushed and strutting, in a pale blue suit. There was a dais, and plastic flowers, and a couple of girls in dresses so flimsy even Maverick felt sorry for them, their pinched white faces and goose-pimpled arms. The Captain made a speech. Everyone clapped. The Captain made another speech. There was more clapping.

"D'you think," said Goose, still clapping, "This guy ever shuts up?"

Maverick folded his arms. "Nope," he said.


	4. Chapter 4

Cameras flashed as the Captain posed, smiling, pointing at Kazansky's new medal. Viper, behind the Captain's staff, had the blank face of a man pushed almost beyond endurance: Kazansky was holding it as gingerly as live explosive.

"Great pilot!" the Captain enthused to the cameras. "A true American hero! It's men like this who make America great!"

Kazansky had several inches in height over their Commander in Chief. When he looked down his nose, he was standing to attention. 

Without that natural advantage, Maverick muttered to himself, "Suck it up." A second later he was ramrod straight, saluting. "Captain." 

The Captain was smiling. "Uh - Pete! Great work, great work." 

He was expecting to shake hands. One of the staffers was filming. Over the Captain's shoulder, an aide was making exaggerated up-and-down hand pumping moments. Maverick said, his face blank, "Sir." 

"Excellent uniform," said the Captain. "Which branch of the service are you?" 

He was still smiling, their Commander in Chief, a fleshy grimace. He'd mastered the art of the two-handed handshake, angled for maximum camera exposure, as artificially insincere as any social climber.

"Navy. Sir," said Maverick, holding his salute. Viper was trying to catch his eye.

"Great ship!" said the Captain. Most of the aides offered a few claps. Another handed the Captain a small card, disguising the failed handshake. The line shuffled down a step. The Captain read the card, held out his hand again: Goose was already saluting.

"Nick!" said the Captain. "Great work! Enjoy the party!" 

"Sir," said Goose. His chin went up a notch, his shoulders straightened, and his salute, crisp to begin with, sharpened into the rigidity of a presidential honor guard. "Sir, we've been on lockdown for six weeks," Goose said.

"Mitchell," hissed Kazansky. He was too late. Maverick already had his boot on Goose's foot.

"Excellent!" said the Captain. "Let's make it a party to remember!"

"I want," said Goose, "To call my wife."

"What?" snapped the Captain. "Nothing's stopping you! Pick up a phone! Call her!" He was stepping back. "Get me a phone," he ordered. Three of the aides twitched violently.

"Sir," Goose said. "We're on lockdown. We've been on lockdown for six weeks."

"Security," said one of the executive officers. "Mr. Captain, sir, national security demands no outside contact."

Maverick was grinding his sole into Goose's instep. 

"Threatening the war effort," another added.

"Your own regulation," said the tallest officer.

"That's not what I meant," Goose said, "I just want to call my wife."

Maverick gave up. He lifted his boot and stood up for his wingman. "He's right. It's been too long."

"Sometimes sacrifices are necessary," said the first officer. "After evaluating the full situation, the Captain himself decreed a communication blackout."

"A wise choice," said the second officer. He was staring at Goose. "The Captain. Is always right."

The Captain's face was flushing. "What? _What_? He said I was wrong?" He was leaning forward, his eyes starting to bulge. "I am the law," he said. "We are under attack. Our nation is under threat. I am working all hours of the day and night to secure our borders - no one works harder than me. And you - I wrote the regulations. I am the regulations. Do you understand?" 

He was spitting in Goose's face. Goose had not moved. 

"Maverick," Kazansky hissed.

"He understands," Maverick said. "Sir, he understands. It's been a while, that's all he means, he wanted to know if there was a projected end date, you know, a point when...we've won."

"No," said the Captain.

"Uh, sir, we have a-"

"We have won," said the Captain. "Now we're consolidating. Negotiating. Making a deal."

"Sir," said Maverick.

"There's nothing I do better," said the Captain. His eyes were narrowed. 

"Sir, I will make very sure these gentlemen understand the task in hand," Viper said. He'd stepped forward, shielding Kazansky, moving to stand between Goose and the group of aides.

"You'd better," said the Captain. "I'm seeing a lack of commitment from these Navy types and I don't like it. Keep your men under control or I'll find someone who can."

"I hear you," Viper said. His face was utterly without expression.

"Do what he says, Colonel," hissed one of the aides. 

Viper's eyes tracked his back across the room. 

"What the fuck," he said, very quietly, still watching. "What the fuck were you thinking?"

Maverick said, "Is that a rhetorical question? Because I went to military school and the curriculum-"

"Shut up, Maverick," Viper said. "All three of you. My room. Eight bells. We're going to discuss loyalty, oaths, and the American Constitution." His tone made it perfectly plain that discussion was going to be one-way.

"Sir," said Maverick, tugging at the collar of his dress whites.

Kazansky said, "Viper." 

"Yeah, Ice," said Viper, very quietly. "Good to see you too." He raised his voice. "Eight Bells. Copy?"

"Confirm," said Maverick. He still had one hand on Goose's arm, holding him back, just in case.

No party was ever going to be a joyous occasion after that exchange. The Captain and his immediate staff had stalked past the reception line and straight through the meeting room behind it, the aides had descended on the food as if miniature hot dogs and palm-size popcorn punnets were the only available meal of the day, and the only member of the carrier crew present was one of the junior lieutenants, pale-faced, tight-lipped, and packing a quarter bottle of medicinal tequila. She'd offered to share, but the weary brace of her shoulders marked her as embattled as the pilots. Also present were remarkable number of secretaries, assistants, and other assorted desk flyers, none in uniform, a collection of men with suspicious hairlines and ostentatious watches, and a few women in power suits with loose blonde hair and tired eyes. The music was loud, the stewards looked distinctly worn, and the ambience of the room itself with its gilt and oil-paintings felt as if they were attending a trade presentation rather than a naval reception. 

"You wanna blow this joint?" They'd endured ten minutes, long enough for Goose to stop shaking and Maverick to decide the potential for getting laid was a negative zero. 

"Admirable action on regulating climate change," said the man in the Armani suit. "The previous administration's stance was crippling to enterprise."

"Yeah," Goose said, which was more than he'd said in the previous fifteen minutes.

"Absolutely," said the man with the very soft and lingering hands. "And with the deregulation of unions, there's a real chance to clean up right across the Midwest. Creating jobs, that's what this administration is all about."

"Iceman?"

Kazansky shook his head. His dress whites were still pristine, irritatingly lacking the smear of mustard with which Maverick had managed to decorate his sleeve, his boots polished, his hair shorn back to its half-inch crew. He looked like someone's pet staff officer.

"There'll be some real opportunities on the west coast," said the man in the Armani suit. "I've got my eye on Palo Alto. Give it three years or so, send a clean up crew in-"

"What did you say?" said Goose.

The man in the Armani suit looked Goose up and down from his cap to his dress shoes. "I thought this was a restricted area," he said. 

"What did you say about Palo Alto?" said Goose.

"Goose," said Maverick. He was watching people turn towards them.

"No, go on," said Goose. "I want to know. Because last thing I heard, Palo Alto was a stinking hole in the ground, a fucking war grave, and you stand there-"

"Goose."

"-slicing it up like some kind of trophy, and I-"

"Someone get this man out of-"

"Get the fuck off of-"

The sound system opened up as loudly as an Antonov on steroids and there were men in black suits and sunglasses knifing through the crowd. Maverick said, "Goose, man, I love you," and let fly with a practised staged punch. Goose went down like a bowling pin. Maverick pulled a face at the man in Armani, and shrugged. "Sorry."

"Oh, for the love of God," said Kazansky, and laid hold of Maverick's collar.

They regrouped in the restroom. 

"You don't get to renegotiate this," Maverick said, dabbing at Goose's nose with a wad of paper towels. "I'm the one with the great ideas. _I_ get to pull this shit and _you_ get to talk us out of it."

Goose was staring straight ahead.

"Look, I know-" Maverick said, and spared a glance for the door, where Kazansky was repelling staffers and executives with an icy stare. There was, he told them, a medical emergency. "This isn't normal, it's not right, but we can't-"

"Don't tell me what to do, Mav," Goose said. His eyes snapped up, pinned Maverick into silence. "You don't get to step in here. It's my wife. My kid. My _wife_."

"Yeah, I get that," said Maverick.

"No, you don't," said Goose. "You've never met a piece of tail you don't want to chase, Mav, and that's fine, okay, but I'm talking about my _wife_."

"Okay," said Maverick. He pushed Goose's face a little to the left. 

"And, like it's some piece of nothing, like she's nothing-"

"Ah, hell," Maverick said, and dropped the bloody towel. "Goose. Goose." 

Kazansky turned his face away, Goose tipped his head back and closed his eyes, and Maverick hugged him. "Hey," he whispered. "I love her too. I love them both."

Even a gold plated tap was not immune to faulty washers. It dripped. The air-conditioning whirred, Kazansky scuffled his shoes, and the crowd outside started clapping. Goose said, "Yeah, I know," and pushed Maverick away. He was looking at Kazansky, then back at Maverick. ""You're gonna...we're gonna fix this, Ice, yeah? Because I think - Mav and me, I'm not-"

Kazansky looked away from the door. He said nothing. 

"Right," said Goose. He buttoned up his collar and tugged his sleeves straight. "Come on. Let's go."

They'd missed the first speech, slipping into the back of the meeting room just as the lights went down. In darkness, REM told them it was the end of the world as they knew it, and the crowd began clapping. Then, clapped some more. Then the shouting starting, a thumping melee of voices calling for the Captain. 

When the spotlights centered, he was already on the dais, pumping his fist. "Yeah!" he said. "Yeah!" His face was flushed, his sleeves rolled up, his hair gleaming, lacquered into place. "Welcome to the future!"

The woman next to Maverick screamed in excitement. He had to look away, catching the eye of one of the stewards. The steward, too, was not clapping. 

"Settle down, folks," said the Captain. "We've got - yeah, we've got stuff to get through, some really exciting news I wanna share, and I wanna tell you folks, we're here tonight to celebrate the success of the first five weeks of this new venture. I'm feeling it tonight!" 

"You feeling it tonight, Iceman?" Maverick murmured. 

"You gotta respect this Navy brand," the Captain said. "I'm telling you, we've got sixty meter radio masts out there, folks! We're gonna pick up anything out there and kill it dead! We got thirty seven miles of microphone cable! We got eyes on a thousand miles of ocean!"

Slowly, Kazansky glanced sideways, one eyebrow raised.

"And right here on this boat we've been restructuring! We've been making changes, cutting costs, working hard for our money! Four hundred new jobs created last week alone!"

"So that's what happened to Dewayne," Maverick muttered. 

"The future's so bright," said the Captain, "I've gotta wear shades!"

More clapping. Maverick looked at Goose. "I feel a need..." he said.

"Funny, that," Goose said. "So do I." 

As one, they leapt for the fire alarm.


	5. Chapter 5

"I'm not seeing the funny side in this situation, gentlemen," Viper said. 

Maverick coughed. "Neither am I, sir," he said. 

Viper favored him with a lengthy, weighted stare. "Our Commander in Chief was not amused by last night's events. Emphatically not amused. Were it not for our current strategic military position, not only would all three of you be grounded, you would be anticipating a disciplinary board and the possibility of dishonorable discharge. The Captain..." Viper moved to the narrow window. Light barred his face, sharpening the lines around his mouth and between his eyes. "The Captain was narrowly averted from immediately enacting that discharge. Do you understand me?"

"Sir," said Kazansky.

"Let me lay this out for you," said Viper. "There is only one way off this ship. You three came very close to taking that route, last night."

"For telling the truth?" Maverick said, adding, belatedly, "Sir." 

"You set off the fire alarm, Lieutenant, you didn't expose Watergate," Viper snapped. 

"We, Sir. We set off the fire alarm," Goose said. "Maverick - ah, Lieutenant Mitchell and I, Sir. Colonel Kazansky wasn't involved."

"I'm sure the three security staff currently in the infirmary would argue that the Colonel was without question physically present," Viper said. "As it is, the Colonel outranks me." The look he gave Kazansky was very steady, although Kazansky did not drop his eyes. "The fact remains that last night you gave our Commander in Chief good reason to doubt your loyalty to our country, its elected representatives, and your commitment to our current mission. Do I need to remind you, gentlemen, that it is the role of elected officials and civilians to make policy? It is _not_ our role. It _is_ our role to enact that policy to the best of our ability. Is that clear?"

"Hypothetically-" said Maverick.

"There is no hypothetical, lieutenant," said Viper.

Kazansky cleared his throat. "And if -"

"Colonel," Viper said. 

"Nothing," said Kazansky. 

"I expect you to do your duty," Viper said. "Nothing more, nothing less. Understood?"

"Sir," said Maverick.

"Sir."

"Good," said Viper. For a moment, he stood by the window, looking at them, and then he walked to his desk. "Lieutenant Mitchell, you've always been a team player."

Kazansky twitched. Viper did not look at him. "One of the highest regarded pilots the Navy has ever produced. As a country, we invested millions into your training. In return, we expect nothing but the best. I expect you, Maverick, and you, Goose, to uphold our oath to support and defend our constitution against all enemies, and to bear true faith and allegiance to the same. Like our fathers before us, even in - especially in - these challenging circumstances, we will keep that oath. I will have no more childish pranks."

"Yes, sir," said Maverick. 

"Do not give our Commander in chief reason to doubt your word," said Viper.

"No, sir," Maverick said.

"Acknowledged. And dismissed. Get out of here."

Goose closed Viper's office door very, very gently. He jerked his head at the flight deck above them, and Maverick nodded. The accommodation block was noisy, busy with pilots and flight crew working overlapping shifts, ship's crew and stewards and officers. Outside, they could talk without interruption. 

Their boots rang on steel. A steward passed them with a covered tray, and a couple of ratings going off duty eyed them with the traditional contempt of the carrier's crew for the cosseted pilots. The vending machine outside the cinema on deck three was out of coffee, and the pizza franchise next to it was closed. Through the loudspeaker, the duty officer ran tiredly through shift allocations and a reminder of man overboard drill: Maverick balled his fists in his pockets and shook his head. The AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY sign on the deck side door was looking increasingly worn and the sky outside was grey and heavy with cloud, but Maverick's shoulders relaxed once they were outside.

"Tell me when this deployment ends again," Goose said.

Maverick kicked at the flight deck. "We're still flying," he said.

"The only reason we're not grounded is because there isn't anyone else," Goose said. "Look, Mav..."

"Yeah, I know," Maverick said. 

"No," Goose said. "Maverick. Someone's got to Viper."

"Oh, ya think," said Maverick. 

"Offices are always monitored," Kazansky said, his voice offhand. "Might be bugged."

"Viper practically tells us everything's gone to shit and command's compromised," Maverick said.

"Like we didn't know that already," said Goose.

"Right," said Maverick. They'd reached the rail. He was staring at the clouds, the slow turmoil of the laden air. "Kazansky, if-"

Kazansky's body had stiffened. He was staring intently over the rail.

"You see something?" Maverick asked.

"Three o'clock," said Kazansky.

"Yeah, I got it. Wreckage?"

"Looks like a raft," said Kazansky.

Seen from the deck, the object looked like a black cushion, sluggish and wallowing in the waves. "Air mattress?" said Goose.

"Tire," suggested Maverick.

From the control tower behind them, there was a muffled pop, and then a spurt of water next to the wreckage. Someone was firing. Goose turned around and peered upwards. "Isn't there a range on this carrier?" he said.

"It's a rubber boat," said Kazansky. "There's something weighting it down."

They watched as it neared, drawn in by the carrier's powerful wash. Further along the rail, a couple of marines were looking down at it as well, and one of the flight deck clean-up crew was shouting into the forward hanger. As it came closer, they could see it was a boat, the kind of rubber boat kids took to the swimming pool, nothing that would be a safe choice on the Indian Ocean. It was close enough now to see the yellow stripes on the plastic and the bright red of a streamer fastened to sagging plastic rowlocks. 

One of the marines threw out a grappling hook, missed, and threw again. The hook caught. Towed in and bobbing, the boat weathered the carrier's wash, coming up in a rush to the deck side. Eager sailors and marines peered over the rails.

"...shit," said Goose.

Sickeningly, in the base of the boat, there were two dead bodies. They were curled around each other, embracing. They'd been at sea for some time, their bodies desiccated and blanched by the salt air, white skin showing through the rips in their clothing. One of the bodies had long hair, matted and stiff, hiding both of their faces.

Refugees. Survivors.

"Ah, _hell_ ," said Maverick. 

The tallest marine crossed himself. The maintenance crew were lining up to point over the rail, shouting. Kazansky glanced up. He said, very quietly, "The only difference between us and them is that this ship's bigger." 

"Cut that rope," a marine lieutenant ordered. "There's nothing we can do here."

Goose turned his head away. Maverick touched his shoulder. "It's pointless," he said. "We'd bring them on board, sew them up, and throw them off again."

Cut loose, the rubber boat tipped and weaved, deflating, closing around its cargo. The hook had punctured the plastic. 

"Poor bastards," Kazansky muttered.

"Lucky bastards," muttered one of the marines. 

It was time to suit up. Their first flight of the day was in forty minutes.


	6. Chapter 6

"See," said Goose, and giggled, "The thing is that - the thing is - I can't actually remember what the thing is." He looked at his glass. "Get me another drink, hon." 

"We finished the bottle," said Maverick. 

"Then find another one," Goose said, exasperated.

"You're going to regret this in the morning," Maverick said. He looked at the ceiling. "I can't believe I'm saying that."

"See the thing is," said Goose, "There's nothing left." He peered into the base of his glass. "Mav."

"Yeah, I know, buddy," Maverick said. He leaned back against the pillows, crossed his ankles, and closed his eyes. Propped on the opposite rack, Goose had begun to list, his eyelids drooping, his head nodding forward. In a few minutes, he was asleep. 

Maverick stared at the poster opposite, the schematics of an Italian racing bike he'd never ridden, decorated with a blonde he had not yet met. There were folders stacked up on the floor with report notes from other flights, fruitless combat missions and null radar readings, the sum of scratch briefings held in cabins and wardrooms after the flight crew's briefing room had been compromised. Every pilot on the carrier came from a different base, and although the inevitable networking of the Navy aligned like with like, men like Jack Feistier, Air Force One's duty pilot the day the president fled the United States, or Mahood, a Gulf War EWO veteran discovered in the carrier's laundry room, had little in common besides their wings. The makeshift squadron was without the traditions or command structure of a traditional deployment and hamstrung by the nature of their deployment. Under contradictory orders and in an alien arena, they did their best, and in Viper they had a commander dedicated to their service, but without a tangible enemy and beset by the paranoia of their ultimate commander they were struggling to find common purpose beyond the drain of the endless, pointless combat air patrols. 

The stack was high enough for Maverick to reach the first report without stretching. He tapped his fingers on the cover, staring at it, another null mission, another listing of failing systems and restricted communications.

Goose was sleeping. Maverick snatched up a spare blanket and dropped it over his weapons officer, took the single short stride to the door, and was out in the corridor. The lighting was dim, the loudspeaker was silent, and the whole carrier was at his disposal. He walked, past the silent briefing room and the closed cabins of his makeshift squadron, past Viper's office with the light still coming under the door, past the dark mess room and the silent comms room, out into the main corridors of the ship. A carrier was never silent, but it was obvious this one was wounded. Men shuffled to silent work-stations. Officers hesitated. There was a single dispirited cleaning crew. Even the great concourse was almost empty, shops and restaurants closed, the cinema advertising a movie Maverick had seen twice before. He was nearly under the executive offices now, the heart of the ship, spaces that should have been crowded with the ship's crew, the sailors and the drone operators and the spooks and the supply team, the men and women who performed the endless array of tasks that kept the great carrier viable. 

He was almost at the heart of the operations zone. Ahead, the corridor was barred by yellow and black warnings, the strident signage of the restricted area, and a locked door. A man in flight overalls was tapping at the keypad. In the low light, his hair was pale and not platinum, but the set of his shoulders and the way he carried his head was unmistakable. As Maverick watched, Kazansky entered a code he had no business knowing, waited for the door to hiss open, and ducked inside.

Maverick followed. 

Walking swiftly, purposely, Kazansky bypassed weapons control and radar. Only a sideways glance showed that he was aware of the satellite communications rooms, the electronic surveillance and the radar monitoring. The rooms were empty, as Maverick had never seen them, hauntingly absent: there were abandoned files and coffee cups on the desks, a set of headphones lying across a keyboards, pinned up pictures, post-its and notes left to curl at the edges and fade. Kazansky moved past the ghosts of a technology that had once ruled the sea. 

They came, finally, to the great control room where the Captain and his officers monitored every move the ship made. Here, too, Kazansky tapped in a code on the panel, and the door opened. He glanced back.

"You coming?"

"Yeah," said Maverick, and walked inside.

The room was empty. The lights were down, although the screens and control panels were still live, the iridescent green of the radars, the flat pulse of the electronic monitoring, the great flickering banks of switches and codes that controlled the world's most advanced aircraft carrier. There was a faint static hum, prickling the hairs on the back of Maverick's neck, and quiet interrogative beeps from the control panels. Here, the chairs were tidily tucked under the desks. There were no discarded jackets or coffee mugs, although the delicate film of dust smeared under Maverick's hands, and his footsteps sounded eerily loud.

"Ice?"

Kazansky was bending over one of the desks, looking at a flat screen. "Yeah."

"Am I - where is everyone?"

"Command moved the control center upstairs," Kazansky said. With care, he tapped a couple of keys on the keyboard, then a small string of numbers.

"Huh," Maverick said. He moved to Kazansky's side. "Well, let's hope no one sends a submarine. One lucky strike and we're toast."

Kazansky glanced up. "You think there's anyone else left who cares?" 

Maverick looked back. "We made it."

"Yeah," Kazansky said. "We did." He tapped the screen. "Look."

It was a conventional radar screen, the ebb and flow of green coloration fueled by the spinning beam. A red diamond marked the carrier's position, a solid line its confirmed course, a dotted line its projected course. The lines formed a circle. At 180 degrees, the dotted line firmed into the solid. 

The carrier sailed. The circle moved with it, endless and unbroken.

"Well," Maverick said eventually. "It doesn't look like we're going anywhere."

"Yup," said Kazansky. His hands were flattened on the desk, his head bent over the screen. "Sailing in circles." 

"So that was why we lost GPS."

"Obvious," said Kazansky.

Maverick breathed out, long and slow, the barest hint of a whistle. "Maybe for you, Iceman. The rest of us aren't telepaths."

Kazansky hesitated, tapped his fingers on the screen, and frowned. When he looked up, it was directly at Maverick. "There were fifty-six of us left on Diego after the tsunami. We patched up the shortwave transmitter. We got half a town in New Zealand. Antarctic researchers. We got some guy in Siberia, a couple from Japan. One from Finland."

"Nothing from home." 

"No," said Kazansky. "Interference was exceptional. Range was limited."

"You couldn't..." Maverick takes a swift step away from the desk, walks to one of the control panels, glares at it, spins on his heel and walks back. "You couldn't think to mention this?"

"I had to be sure," Kazansky said.

"Sure of what? That the whole fucking world is fucked? I could have told you that! Goose could have told you that!" Maverick was walking, short, choppy steps slamming between screen and control panels.

Kazansky said, "This is not a mission. This is not deployment. This is the goddam end of the world and someone knows what the fuck is going on."

"The Captain?" Maverick snorted.

"Or his team," Kazansky said. 

"Those jokers."

"Funny you should say that." Kazansky hesitated. 

"He's alive? Joker?"

"He was when I left Diego," Kazansky said. 

"He sent you," said Maverick. "He sent you, didn't he? Tell me he sent you. Tell me there's someone out there who knows what the fuck they're doing. Ice. Tell me."

Kazansky was shaking his head. "He's not - he's doing as well as anyone could. I have no idea - no one else could have landed that jet. But." Kazansky's hands closed on the desk. "He's - I trust him."

"Goddamn right," said Maverick. His face was lit up, alive, he was grinning. "Ice, that means-"

"It means fuck all!" Kazansky said. "That guy up there is still our Commander in Chief!"

"Then why are you here?" Maverick demanded. "Ice! If Joker's out there, if there's some kind of - structure, if you've got radio-"

"There have been no transmissions from the carrier," Kazansky said. 

"What?"

"Nothing in, nothing out," said Kazansky. "We - I - had to be sure."

"And now? What now? We're alive here. He's alive. And he's fucking this up just like he-"

"He is our elected leader, Mitchell!"

"He's an idiot!" Maverick shouted. 

"And so what?" Kazansky said. "He's a symbol, he's the government-"

"Like fuck-"

"So you don't care. But the rest of us need rules. We need something we can trust."

"He isn't your fucking daddy, Ice!" Maverick was in Kazansky's face, shouting.

"Because yours-"

"Don't go there."

"So what's your plan, Maverick? Sit here until you starve?" Kazansky, furious, weighted every word, his voice dropping. 

"You think he's the answer? This is the answer?" Maverick's arms described the silent room. "All he's got is more of the same! We get the hell out of here, we find Joker, we find a way!"

"There is nothing out there," Kazansky said. "Nothing. Do you hear me? Nothing!"

Maverick tucked his fingers around Kazansky's collar, each finger curled over the cloth with care, deliberate as a pre-flight ritual. "Or are you just scared?" Maverick asked. His voice, too, was low. "Don't worry, baby. Maverick's here."

"You're not as funny as you think you are," Kazansky hissed, scowling.

"You're not as pretty as you think you are," Maverick retorted. His fingers tightened. 

"And you'd know."

"I think I would," said Maverick. He was grinning. "You're not going to win this one," he said. 

"This is bigger than your ego-" Kazansky said, and cut the words off. His eyes were widening. 

Intimately intrusive, Maverick's other hand was cupped between Kazansky's legs, pressing up into his crotch. "Do you actually have balls, or are you just stuffing a sock in there?"

"Maverick," Kazansky said. 

"I'll let you know..." Maverick said. "Oh. Looks like we've got something." His grin was broadening. "Well. Pleased to see me, Iceman?" 

Kazansky laughed. He ducked his head for a second, hiding the high turn of his cheekbones, his wide mouth, the dip of his eyelashes, and then his eyes snapped up to Maverick's. He widened his stance, head up, shoulders back, solid and grounded. "I don't play chicken," he said. He was still smiling when his own hand closed around Maverick's and ground their palms, hard, against the thrust of his cock under the zipper of his flying suit. 

"That's good," said Maverick. Eliminating the half step forward that had separated them, he muscled into Kazansky's space, head tilted back to meet the narrow, glittering line of Kazansky's eyes. He licked his lips. "Neither do I."


	7. Chapter 7

Rolling naked out of bed, Kazansky snatched up his Navy issue underwear, shoved his feet through the holes and dragged them up one handed, reaching for his flight suit. The alarm was a strident wail outside the cabin. "Get up!"

"What the actual-" Maverick was rolling over, rubbing at his eyes, his dog-tags sliding free of the blanket and his hair spiked with sleep. "Shit!" 

Kazansky spotted his boots beside the locker, grabbed them, and threw Maverick a t-shirt and a pair of boxers. The siren went up a notch in volume. "Air crew to the flight deck! Air crew to the flight deck!"

"Shit, shit, where's-" Maverick was hopping on one foot, overalls bunched around his waist. There was bruising on his neck and a reddened trail down his chest.

Kazansky threw a boot at him. "Yours."

"They come in pairs!" Maverick said, scrabbling through the tumbled blankets, unearthing three socks and a cascade of stiffened wet wipes. 

"Right," said Kazansky. He straightened his sleeves, tugged at his collar, and snapped a quick check at himself in the mirror by the door. Then he was gone. 

Maverick, considerably more disheveled, was thirty seconds behind him. 

"As you can hear-"

"Red alert! Red alert! Crew to action stations!"

"- as you can hear," said Viper, unruffled, standing in front of the briefing room smart boards, "We have an intrusive vessel within the exclusion zone. We have a null response to challenge. At this stage, we have no eyes on target, which is where you gentlemen-"

"Terrorist alert! All crew action stations! Terrorist alert!"

"-are being tasked with recon and challenge. Maverick, Goose, Iceman, you're on point. Attack if necessary, do not do so without explicit permission-"

"Naughty!"

Viper glared at the loudspeaker. "-from myself as ranking flight officer. Co-ordinates will be in your flight path logs. At present the vessel is just over nine fifty miles out, proceeding at four knots on a direct course: you will have full tanks. Pickford, Brooklyn, you're on reserve, be ready to go on my word. There will be no tankers airborne. Any questions?"

"Will we have comms?" said Kazansky.

"You'll have-" Viper's face was impassive, but the sheaf of files in his hands shivered, once and briefly. "You'll have air-to-ship, you will not have closed air-to-air."

"Bullshit!" said Maverick. "How are we supposed to -?"

"I am informed that trust violations justify the termination of closed combat communication," Viper said. "Or in other words, Maverick, adhere to mission relevant material, do not compare your dick size. Clear?"

"Twenty on Ice," said Pickford, holding out his hand.

"Nah," said Goose. "C'mon."

"Misplaced loyalty, man, you seen Kazansky's feet? Not to mention the-" Harker's hands described an exaggerated height difference. "-short thing. Tall thing!" he added, ducking away from Maverick's furious glare.

The siren cut out, briefly. The Captain said, "-an American war-"

"If we're looking at hand size, what d'you think that says about-"

The siren started, louder. "Gentlemen!" Viper snapped. "We are mission go."

In seconds, the room was empty. On deck, the pre-flight crews were swarming the F-18s, the deck crew already in position. Kazansky was jogging, his balaclava on, his helmet in one hand, one of the off-duty pilots running up beside him with his flight duffle, and the ladder to the cockpit was already in place. 

It took four minutes for pre-flight checks. Forty seconds to taxi into place. Less than half a second for the catapults to propel them off the flight deck, the F-18s already at a hundred and fifty miles an hour by the time they cleared the runway, at three hundred in seconds, at four hundred, banking into the clouds.

"Iceman."

"Look left."

"Yeah, I gotcha," Maverick said. "The radar's still working, Colonel." He toggled the radio channel, got nothing. Nothing. Flicked back to command. 

"...is your captain speaking. You guys get out there, secure our territory, I want maximum prejudice, you understand me? Maximum firepower. Hit them where it hurts. I want-"

Command cut off with a touch of Maverick's finger. For a second, there was no contact at all, the two planes unmoored in cloud. The flight plan flickered. The radar, empty but for the carrier's shadow and the two F-18s, stayed steady. Maverick said, "Goose?"

"Hold it steady," said Goose. "I just got a thing."

"What kind of thing? Goose? What are you-"

"-heading two seven five, fifteen thousand, close formation, can you clarify fuel, over," said Viper's voice.

"Command, riding high," said Maverick. "Nine thousand liters, over."

"Iceman has nine thousand two," said Kazansky. His voice over the radio was clipped. 

"Command confirms," said Viper. "Forecast, wind strength twenty knots south south east at fifteen thousand, heavy cloud, confirm over."

"Hand-holding all the way," Maverick drawled.

" _Confirm_ over," Viper said, louder, reminding them they were not alone in the sky.

"Confirm," said Maverick.

"Confirm," said Kazansky.

They flew.

At nine hundred and fifty miles out from the carrier, the heart of the exclusion zone, the intruding ship was fifty minute's flight-time away, a welcome break for Maverick, who had been tied down to close-quarter combat air patrol for weeks. With a full tank of gas and an empty sky, the pilots owned the air. Even Viper hogging the radio meant little more than the occasional confirmation. Maverick was whistling.

"Ah, come on, man," said Goose. 

"What, you don't like Brittney?" said Maverick. "Everyone likes Brittney. Come on. One more time."

"Maverick," Kazansky muttered. Perfectionist, his F-18 was an exact fifty feet off Maverick's left side.

"What, you want something?" said Maverick, waving. "I can-"

"Five minutes to contact," Viper said. 

"Confirm," said Maverick, and put his fingers back on the throttle.

The ship was a speck on the horizon, and then, swiftly, a ship, a ship under way, the flat pale streak of wake behind her and the sea swelling at her bows. She was a hundred and twenty feet long, an ocean-going trawler, her decks crowded with wooden boxes and containers, her radar and echo-sounder spinning slowly above the wide, white cabin roof. The broad windows of her captain's cabin were dark under the fractured cloud base. 

"Control, I have active radar," Kazansky said. "Not hostile. Do you have communication? Over."

There was a pause. Maverick flicked from channel to channel.

"That's a negative, Iceman," Viper said. 

Kazansky said nothing.

"Hey, Ice," Maverick said. "You wanna take a look?"

"Control. I'd like you to emphasize unauthorized presence in the exclusion zone," Viper said. "Briefing orders apply."

Behind Maverick, Goose muttered, "He means, buzz the hell out of them, hotshot."

Maverick flicked the radio closed for a second, finger on the switch. He hesitated, frowning, and opened up again. "Gotcha. Iceman, Maverick banking left."

"Iceman banking right," said Kazansky. His F-18 was already peeling down. 

Maverick followed. The sea was a sullen grey under the clouds, the ship appearing as small as a child's toy, a single bright spark on the F-18's radar. Ahead, Kazansky's F-18 steadied, holding course fifty feet above the waves, almost the same height as the ship's superstructure. The noise of the plane was already bringing people to the starboard rails, tiny figures running from the containers on the deck, waving. 

At half a mile out, five seconds away, Kazansky blew the afterburners. His fly-by was so close the ship seemed to hesitate in the water, heeling from the power of a subsonic jet at full burn: the noise alone must have been crippling. The ship was beginning to recover as Maverick straightened out on the port side and opened up his own extra fuel injectors. Thrust pinned Maverick and Goose to their seats, hurtled the plane to 800mph, parted the sea beneath them and shook the ship from stem to stern. 

"Collapse damage to deck structures," Kazansky reported. "Sustained instability, intensive crew activity."

"Think they noticed us," Maverick said, tucking in at Kazansky's wing.

"Ice, report any change of course," Viper said. 

"Give them a minute or two to get straight," Kazansky said.

"Both pilots, clarify fuel, over," Viper said.

"Six thousand three," said Kazansky.

"Six thousand," said Maverick. "Enough for a couple more dives."

"Course?"

Kazansky was silent on the radio.

"Course?"

"No change," Kazansky said. 

"The exclusion zone is inviolable!" the radio burst out. Maverick winced. "We must protect our borders! We must send a message to the world!"

"Ah-"

Maverick cut them off for a second.

"-fuck," Goose breathed.

"Sir," Viper said. "Please specify your intent."

"Make them pay," said the Captain. "Send them a lesson they'll never forget."

"Permission to fire warning shot, sir," Kazansky said, his voice fast and clipped, the way it got when he was flying hard.

"Given," Viper snapped.

Kazansky was already banking down. Beneath him, the ship sailed on. Circling at two thousand feet, Maverick could see the small, frantic figures on the deck hunker down. There was no sign of any retaliatory activity. The ship did not appear to be armed. 

"In position," Kazansky reported. "Arming. Fire."

He'd sent a flare across the bows of the ship, a bright surge of flame bright enough that Maverick turned his head away. The heat would blister the ship's paint, but no serious damage would be done, a perfect warning shot. "Good burn, Ice," Maverick said, watching Kazansky pull up. 

The ship was still on course. 

"Maverick," said Viper. "Course confirmation."

Maverick coughed. "Uh..." His fingers were sweaty on the throttle. "No change. Sir."

"Burn them," said the Captain. 

Kazansky said, "Iceman to Control, mission report, warning shot fired, impact assessment obscured visibility, request permission-"

"Get that ship off my ocean," said the Captain. "No more excuses. Do your job."

The throttle moved. The horizon shifted and spun, slow, crystal clear. It would be a textbook shot, unopposed, easy as shooting a duck in a barrel.

The people on the deck were pointing up at the plane. 

"Viper," Maverick said slowly. "Vessel appears unarmed. Permission to fire?"

The ship was still sailing straight into the exclusion zone. Maverick checked the radar, the sea, sucked in a breath through his teeth and snatched a glance back at the ship and its passengers. 

"Viper, do I have permission to fire?" he said again. 

A missile would blow ship and passengers sky-high. There was no defense.

"Viper. Do you copy?"

On deck, figures were crowding around one of the radio masts.

"Clear copy, Maverick," said Viper. He sounded flat. "Maximum destruction. Do I repeat?"

"I hear you," said Maverick. He had four thousand five pounds of fuel left, enough for one run. 

He tipped the switch. "Armed."

"Mav, no," Goose whispered.

Maverick closed his eyes. Light stuck down at his closed eyelids, blood-red and heated.

"Mav."

When Maverick opened his eyes, sunshine hollowed out the clouds and glittered the waves beneath him, exposing, cruelly naked, the battered ship ahead. The clouds had broken. There were people on deck, a whole crowd of people. The ship had not changed course.

"Armed," he said.

"Fire," said Viper.

"Fire," Maverick, echoed, and then, "Firing." He hit the button. The missile casing glinted, a lethal streak of light. There was less than a second between ignition and impact.

On the superstructure ahead, heartbreakingly slow, a flag unfurled.


	8. Chapter 8

"You saw that."

There was silence from the back seat, weighted.

"You saw that. Tell me you saw that. Tell me - Goose, fuck, what, I can't-"

"Yeah," said Goose. "I saw it."

A single red light flashed on the console. Maverick said, "Fuck." The jet flew on. Below the cloud base, the waves were dark, rolling to the horizon. 

"Control to Maverick. Heading?"

Maverick stripped off his mask. "What do I tell them, Goose? What do I say?"

Three more lights flicked, dulled, and came back red.

"Control to Maverick. Confirm."

"Target attained," said Goose. "We're low on fuel."

"I know!" said Maverick. 

"Control to Maverick. Intent. Confirm."

"Maverick to control, confirm, target...we're coming in. Over."

"Confirm, Control."

The jet banked, turning. Maverick said, "Goose, I got negatives on the half a dozen relays here. What are you reading?"

"Negative comms, negative override, negative - I'm loosing systems here as fast as I can bring them back up. Engines are go. Looks like there's an issue in power delivery."

"We keep straight on, we'll find the ship," Maverick said. "I got - Goose, I got enough fuel to get us back, but we're gonna land in one, okay? No bolting."

"I hear you," Goose said. "Mav...I got terminal cascade here. I think they screwed with the electronics when they screwed with the comms."

"Define screwed for me," said Maverick.

"Screwed," said Goose. 

"I hate it when you say that," said Maverick. 

Goose laughed. "I'm not gonna fight you on that one, Mav," he said. "You see Ice anywhere?" 

"Lost him after the..." Maverick pulled his mask back on. "Hey, Kazansky, you out there? Maverick and Goose."

"Iceman. Holding at three thousand over deck. Where are you?" Kazansky's voice was sharp through the radio.

"Twenty miles out," said Maverick. "Coming up on your three in five. Looking at some relay issues here, Iceman. Might be a bumpy ride."

"I got nothing else to do," Kazansky said. "I'll be here. Show you where the deck is. Talk you down - I know how needy you emotional types get."

Maverick was smiling into his mask. "Thanks, Ice," he said. "Appreciate it. We may have to ditch."

"Got it," said Kazansky. His voice was louder when he said, "Control, you got that? I don't see the SAR helicopter on deck."

It was Viper's voice back on the radio. "SAR unit is gearing up," he said. "Maverick, can you see the ship?"

"Just coming into range," Maverick said. We're at two thousand and dropping, coming in for - shit, Goose, you see that? We got failure on the undercarriage here. Repeat, undercarriage drop failure. Trying reboot. Rebooting. Failure. Shit. We're gonna have to - Viper, I'm gonna-" The fuel alarm went off, strident and panicked. "We're ditching. We're gonna come in on port. Ah, hell, that's the fuel lines gone, engines off, we're gonna do this, we can do this..."

Kazansky was already peeling out of his holding pattern. Maverick and Goose were in sight, too high and too fast, coming up on the carrier. White against the dark of the clouds, Kazansky's jet streamed vapor trails from its wingtips. "I see you," Kazansky said. 

"Ditching on port side," Maverick said. "Goose, get out of here. We're gonna hit hard."

"Hey, Mav," Goose said, his voice calm. "Tell Carole I love her." 

Then he reached for the ejection handle.


	9. Chapter 9

The sole, pathetic advantage of the windowless cell was that its soundproofing killed the loudspeaker. Maverick paced, slashing a wet bare-footed trail across the floor. Kazansky hunkered down by the wall and cracked his knuckles. 

"Bastards," Maverick said, finally, halfway through one six-stride rotation as if he was continuing a conversation, not smashing into one half-finished and bleeding.

Kazansky glanced up. Maverick kept walking. He was tugging at the sleeve of his flight overalls, the ragged edge where the MPs had stripped away his watch. 

"I'm gonna-" Maverick's fist slammed into the wall. "I'll kill them," he said. "I'll string them up, I'll burn them open, I'm gonna smash their little funhouse into - God, I'd kill for-"

"We're gonna," said Kazansky. 

Spinning, Maverick glared back. "He was my family, Ice, you don't get to have Goose too, he was mine."

"Stop." Kazansky's jaw was tensed, his hands fists on his knees. "We do this together."

Maverick was all angles, squared off, pulsing with rage. 

"I'm on your side," Kazansky said. 

"I know, I know, I-" Maverick was staring down. "Yeah," he said. The way his shoulders relaxed was textbook, the deliberate flex of his fingers, the long, slow breaths. "Okay. Okay."

"Come on, Mitchell," Kazansky said. "Work with me. Because the way I see it, we roll over or we fight. And I'm a fighter pilot." 

"I lost my plane, Ice," Maverick said. "I lost-" 

He had stopped walking. Standing up, Kazansky touched his shoulder, telegraphing the move, until it was obvious Maverick was not going to fight. He moved in, closer, his taller body awkwardly slotted into place alongside Maverick's stiff, solid anger. When Maverick's fist hit his shoulder, Kazansky stood still for it, head up, watching the ceiling. "Yeah. Yeah," he said. Maverick's fist was slowing, the blows further apart, weaker. Kazansky looked down, biting his lower lip, and then reeled Maverick in, scrubbing his knuckles over Maverick's hair. "Yeah," he said. "I know. I'll be your flight lead any day." Kazansky's hand slowed. Stopped. He was cupping Maverick's head in his fingers, holding him. "I'm..." He swallowed. "I'm fucking sorry."

"Shut up, Kazansky," Maverick said, muffled. His hands flexed on Kazansky's shoulders. Then gripped. His breathing was wet and ragged.

"We're gonna get out of this," Kazansky said. He was back to staring at the ceiling, eyes closed, hand in Maverick's hair.

"Walk in the park," Maverick muttered. 

"We are the best pilots in the Navy," Kazansky said. "We're gonna do this."

Maverick stepped back. He swallowed, guttural and ugly, and his eyes were wet, but his shoulders were back and his head high. "Better believe it," he said.

When the door opened, they were on opposite sides of the room. Kazansky stood. Maverick did not. Outside in the corridor, four of the dark-suited, bland secret service agents stood, hands clasped. The loudspeaker outside droned, "Further measures to protect our great democratic structure-" and was abruptly cast off, and then XO was in the entrance, his thin face pinched. 

"Colonel Kazansky. Lieutenant Mitchell."

"Sir," said Kazansky, saluting.

Maverick glared upward. His hands dangled between his legs, his flight suit rumpled and stained. 

"I understand there has been a misunderstanding," said the XO, stiffly. The Captain's appointment, a stranger to the ship before Oman, he had an odd arrangement of features, his mouth appearing to move without affecting the rest of his face. 

"Sir," said Kazansky.

"Your presence on this ship is in no way guaranteed by this administration. Your skills are replaceable. Your conduct in questioning administration orders can only be construed as a threat to the great democratic structure we are here to defend. A formal enquiry will be held tomorrow morning. Do not - I repeat - do not expect leniency. You have twelve hours to prepare your defense. Am I clear?"

Standing, slowly, Maverick was staring at the XO. "On what grounds?" he said.

"Pardon?"

"You're going to hang us out to dry," Maverick said. "Aren't you? You don't want the crew knowing that we fired on an American ship. American refugees. You don't want them to know that we can no longer maintain flight safety. Every time one of those planes goes up in the air pilots are risking their lives. You - it's your-"

"You're over-emotional, Lieutenant Mitchell," said the First Lieutenant. 

"He's right," said Kazansky. "We killed Americans today. How long until you're killing people on this ship? How thin are your resources stretched? We're running low on fuel. How long is it until we start running out of food? Just how badly do you need to make an example out of us?"

"That's ridiculous," said the XO. His face was impassive. "And I would sincerely suggest you think twice before airing these opinions in a court of law." Behind him, one of the secret service men, deliberately, shifted from foot to foot. "The carrier is fully equipped. Our resources are sustainable. This kind of false information risks-"

"You really believe that's true," Maverick said. "You're leading this crew to their deaths, and you know it!"

"You are dangerously misinformed," said the XO. "Do not think your air-show acrobatics will save you here. Spenser!"

One of the secret service men put his hand on the door.

"Don't push your luck," hissed the XO. He stepped back across the threshold. "You are nothing to us. Nothing." 

Maverick, lunging for the door, slammed up against steel. He hung there, flat-palmed. "Son of a bitch."

"He made one big mistake," Kazansky observed, his voice very calm.

"What?"

"He showed his hand," Kazansky said.


	10. Chapter 10

"Jesus, Mitchell!" Kazansky exclaimed, plastered against the wall, his face screwed up with disgust.

"Party trick," Maverick coughed, bent over and heaving. Vomit splattered the bare floor, the smell bitter and foul in the small room. 

"Warn a guy," Kazansky said, holding his nose.

"Just get on with it," Maverick told him, backing up against the wall, still cradling his stomach. Sweat glistened at his temples.

Kazansky stepped gingerly around the mess, and hammered on the outside door. "Hey! Hey out there!" He waited, glancing sideways at Maverick. "If this doesn't work... Hey! Hey! Guards!"

When the door opened, it was Kazansky who jumped the crewman on the other side, spinning him into Maverick's fist. Maverick hit him, once, on the chin. He went down fast, Kazansky holding him steady all the way to the floor. 

Their luck was held. There was only one responder, and although Kazansky hesitated in the doorway, checking the corridor, the alarm did not go off. "Where the hell...?" The walls were blank, cables and insulated pipes lining the ceiling, the lighting low, the doors unlabelled and uncommunicatively closed.

"Bows," said Maverick. "Seventh deck. I'm going right." 

He'd already gone, jogging, elbows working, his bare feet slapping on the steel floor. Rolling his eyes, Kazansky followed, a steady lope. They were both watching the walls. "7.15.4...7.16.4...stairs!" Maverick skidded into the door, grabbed at the handle and set his weight against the pull. It opened easily, spilling him sideways, and Kazansky seized the lead, slamming up the ladder in seconds. "Sixth deck. Right."

"Keep going!" Maverick was at his shoulder. "Stairway seven."

"Yeah, yeah," said Kazansky. He slid into the next stairwell, checking the route ahead. "Clear." 

There was no air-conditioning down here in the storage areas. Sweat gleamed at Maverick's throat, in the dip of his collarbones and the line of his neck. "Up." Fifth deck. Fourth deck. Maverick tripped on a discarded bucket and cursed. "Third," Kazansky said. The walls were painted, the air-conditioning a welcome burst of cool air, and along the corridor a door was opening. They skidded to a decorous swift march, men with purpose. 

"Take it to 75," the rating in the doorway was muttering, a sheaf of papers in his hand. "75. Which 75?" He was a young guy, thin, with a wispy baby moustache. 

Kazansky pointed behind them. "That way," he said. "Aft."

"Oh, it's that way?" the rating said. "Thanks!" His eyes dropped to the paperwork, and then to Maverick's bare feet. He frowned. Maverick kept walking. The rating hesitated, shook his head, and set off along the corridor.

Maverick had just opened the stairway hatch when the alarm went off. Above their heads, the deck two speakers wailed, and the executive officer shouted, "All hands! Intruders on board! All hands! Intruder alert!" Maverick dodged inside, shoulder to the door, making space for Kazansky just as the rating turned. "Hey! Hey, you!"

Deck two was living quarters, crew cabins, decorated with door posters and name plates, the floor scuffed with the passage of military boots. There was a cleaning cart abandoned opposite the door. Kazansky lined up the valve handle: Maverick slotted a broom handle between the spokes, patting it as the door rattled. The rating's "Hey!" was muffled behind steel. 

"...two dangerous individuals," the loudspeaker proclaimed. 

Jogging, Maverick laughed.

"Aid security personal, report suspicious activity, do not impede officers," the loudspeaker ordered. "On duty crew to watch stations. Carry identification at all times."

Ahead, the service door to the hanger bay was open, the lights up, the hum of machinery and the hiss of a welding torch echoing down the corridor. Flight crews worked long shifts to keep the deteriorating jets in the air. 

"- yeah?"

"Yeah," Maverick said, as they both ducked into the hanger, dodging behind the bulk of a tanker, slipping behind the cannibalized skeletons of F-18s that would never fly again, moving from locker to tool bay along the wall. In the center of the hanger crews worked on three of the F-18s, panels open, engines pinned by the fierce glare of the arc lights. Music blared, shielding the flight crew from the loudspeaker's imprecations, hiding the scuffle of Maverick and Kazansky's feet.

The far end of the bay was the helicopter storage area, the hulking, hunch-backed workhorses of the carrier, grounded without fuel and mothballed by the crews. Slipping under rotor blades, Maverick and Goose were only feet away from the open bay door when the first searchers came through, men in black suits, walking fast, fanning out to cover the open floor, peering into the blank windows of the helicopter cabins and poking behind equipment chests.

"Hey, you!" It was Brock, his overalls dirtier, his eyes tired. "This is a restricted area! We're working in here!"

The lead searcher said something harsh and emphatic, pointing at the hanger. 

"No, you're not understanding me!" Brock said. There were other crew members coming up to join him, men casually carrying wrenches and rope and chain. "This. Is a restricted zone. Unauthorized personnel are not permitted to enter. This is Naval regulation and a requirement of the executive body."

All the searchers were moving towards the center of the hanger, watching the confrontation. Behind their line, Maverick and Kazansky skirted the last helicopter and raced for the door.

They were spotted. Someone shouted, and then there was the metallic crack of a bullet hitting steel - Maverick was really running now, sprinting down the corridor, zigzagging - doors were opening, B group pilots yelling, another gunshot as the loudspeaker crackled into life - "Danger! Alert! Second deck incursion!" 

Just as the watertight door slammed shut at the far end of the corridor, a long, hairy arm reached out from the pilot's mess, dragged Maverick sideways, and slammed the door on Kazansky's heels. Men were already racing to blockade the door with serving tables, half a ton of metal scraping along the floor, pushed by whooping fighter pilots. The way to the kitchens was clear, the door open, the new steward in a headlock. "Yeah!" Maverick shouted, skidding across the polished floor. "Guys!"

"Flight deck!" Potato was yelling. "Get up there!"

They were through the door, into the kitchens, dodging past stoves and vaulting the long prep tables. Kazansky upturned a pot rack, sending saucepans and stewing trays clattering across the floor, Maverick swept a counter-top clean, spilling soup and marinade in great arcs of soaking, slippery liquids. They were slamming taps open, tipping stools, pulling down ceiling racks. "Yeah, go go go!" Maverick was yelling.

"Laundry!"

"What!"

"Here!" Kazansky was gone, through a darkened door half-hidden behind a vegetable rack. Maverick, following, found the lights coming up on a wasteland of vast washing machines and shelves crowded with sheets and towels, overalls, shirts, pants - "Here, you idiot!" 

Kazansky had found a spare pair of boots. He was brandishing them. "C'mon!"

"Let go then-" Maverick was hopping on one socked foot. 

Kazansky tripped him into a laundry basket, catching one flailing foot and shoving it into a boot. "Keep still!" 

"Hurry up!" Maverick was knotting off the laces on his left boot. Kazansky had done. Maverick held out his hand, Kazansky dragged him upright, and kicked open the valve on the water pipes as they dived for the door into the steam room. "Out, out-" The heat was stifling, humid and overheated, the tiled floor slippery, the wooden frames weeping moisture. And there was a shadow against the reinforced glass of the corridor door.

Maverick, braced, cannoned into the benches. Wood cracked. The door started to open, Kazansky snatched up a splintered plank and swung, and Maverick yelled, "Look up!" There was a hatch over their heads. The plank crashed off the glass, the shadow behind ducked, the alarm outside was so loud the air felt as if it was vibrating, and Maverick leapt upwards from the collapsing benches. His fist knocked the hatch open, he'd caught the frame with his other hand, flailing, found a grip, and then, biceps bulging, grimacing, dragging himself up. Someone was shouting outside the door. Kazansky looked up and reached up as Maverick was reaching down. He sprung for the ceiling, an impossible, crazy reach of a jump, and Maverick was heaving him up - "Ice, you fat bastard!" - and they were rolling into the vent above the steam room, pipes and conduits and a slim walkway that lead to a maintenance door. They were running again. "Don't touch the pipes!" Maverick yelled.

His last word was lost in the boom of a micro explosion. The steam room door must have been locked. They dived for the door, Kazansky's boot exploding it open, and hit the corridor beyond running as the deep rattle of an assault rifle started up behind them. "Stairs!" Kazansky gasped.

Ahead of them, the door to stairway nine, the route to the flight deck, swung open. Kazansky was hesitating. Maverick went head-first and reckless straight up the ladder, and as he did the lights went out. Darkness slammed down on them, the metal under their hands the only guideline, the shrill beeping of the electrical alarm added to the wail of the siren. "What the, what the actual," Maverick was muttering.

"Climb!" 

They scrambled up the last few steps, and the electrified door to the flight deck opened sweetly as an angel's wings. Outside on the flight deck, the cool night wind whipped across their faces and tugged at Maverick's overalls and his carelessly knotted laces, Kazansky's shock of blond hair and his shirt. Both of them, instinctively, looked at the sky, where the stars, freed from the disguising miasma of the carrier's lights, burned bright in the night sky.

Faintly, over by the first catapult, a flashlight glowed against the elegant, powerful nosecone of an F-18, the jet stationed as if it was prepped and ready for take-off. As Maverick and Kazansky turned towards it, they caught the faint hiss of the refueling lines, and then the abrupt click as the pump shut down.

"Honey," said Maverick, under his breath, "Tell me you remembered the keys." 

"Mitchell," Kazansky hissed, "The day I-" They were splitting up, moving in on either side of the bobbing flashlight, silent footsteps. The jet, a promise of freedom, was so close.

The click of the safety coming off froze them both in their tracks.


	11. Chapter 11

"I was wondering when you two kids were gonna show up," said Viper. He was leaning against the side of the F-18. The flashlight illuminated his pale face and the bushy, indomitable thrust of his moustache.

"Sir!" Maverick, arrested mid-stride, cannoned into Kazansky. "Viper, we gotta-"

"I'll make this quick," said Viper. His right hand was hidden behind his back. Like all the pilots, Viper had surrendered his personal issue Beretta. Like most of them, he had a back-up. 

Kazansky, holding Maverick steady, glanced at the deck behind them. Doors were swinging open in the superstructure, bars of light across the deck, shadows crossing the light.

"Swear to me you'll come back," Viper said. "Find command. Relieve this post."

"Yes," said Kazansky. 

"Thank you, Colonel," Viper said. He coughed. "Let's make this fast. Pre-flights are done. You've got full tanks." He patted the belly of the F-18 he was leaning against, its wings extended, catapult bar in place, and nodded at the second behind it. "Your go bags are on board and I'm your catapult officer tonight. Get the hell out of here, gentlemen."

"We've got no deck light and no comms," said Kazansky, although he'd taken his flight helmet from Viper and was already ducking into it. His voice carried the calm of a mission briefing.

"Piece of cake," said Maverick. He was saluting Viper, swiftly crisp, but his sideways grin was all for Kazansky. "Just follow me. I'll get you there." 

Kazansky rolled his eyes. "Yeah," he said. "I'll just-" Both of them heard the faint pfft of a silenced gun. "Go," he said, and ran for the second jet.

The ladders were already in place, the engines warm, canopies up, the familiar settling smell of a fighter jet's cockpit, sweat and leather and piss, eddying in the night air. Maverick ran up the rungs and flung himself into the seat, fingers setting controls so familiar he could fly blind. Would be flying blind. He leaned out, peering down. "Sir-"

"Just bring us home, Maverick," Viper said, stepping aside.

"I-" Maverick glanced at Kazansky, nodded at the other pilot's thumbs-up. "We will."

Viper ran for the catapult pod. 

Maverick brought the canopy down. Under his fingers, he could feel the raw power of the jet under his fingers, the drag of a 6,400 horsepower engine primed for take-off. Ahead, the landing lights were out, the flight deck completely dark and the superstructure illuminated only by cracks of light where the blinds failed, but the F-18's instruments showed him the line of the runway and the steady green of the catapult alert showed it charged to full pressure, ready to launch. 

Something cracked off the canopy cover. Maverick whispered "Go!" to himself, and hit the afterburner.


	12. Chapter 12

The F-18 carried enough fuel for 2,000 miles. Far enough to reach dry land, not much, if they were to find an airport where they could set down. Without communications, the plane to plane intercom suspended, Maverick chased the red burn of Kazansky's exhausts across the night sky. They went high, the thin air conserving fuel, and straight, driving west. 

Maverick's go bag held a toy binnacled compass Goose had pulled out of a Christmas cracker, one New Year. Eyes on Kazansky's jet, he reached down, fumbled for it, and checked: west. The compass was cold and hard in his hand, held too tightly: he tucked it into the pocket of his flight suit. He'd left his watch behind, but the clock on the dashboard still worked. At ten minutes out, they were two hundred miles from the carrier. At twenty, four hundred, Kazansky balancing fuel consumption and speed, giving them the best chance possible of reaching land and being able to bring the jets down safely when they got there. Six hundred miles. The cloud cover seemed lighter, wispy in the reflected light from Kazansky's F-18. There was a moment when Maverick glanced down and thought he saw a brief glimmer of moonlit sea beneath the jet. Eight hundred miles.

The radio crackled. Instinctively, Maverick's finger snapped to the switch, but dead air was heavy in his headphones. He hesitated, watching the display on the radio, which showed, as it had done for weeks, a blank. No transmission on any radio length. Nothing out there. He and Kazansky were alone. 

When he glanced up, the clouds had cleared from the moon. It hung above them, looking larger in the emptiness of the sky, glimmering silver net reflected in the shifting sea. 

The radar flickered. A electrical crackle jumped across the headphones. They were nine hundred miles from the ship, almost outside the exclusion zone, and the displays were flickering back into life, light after light turning a pale green on the control panel, the AWCS beacon powering up, the GPS online. 

Maverick pulled his mask into place. "Hey, Ice," he said, finger on the switch, plane to plane. "You out there?"

"Maverick," said Kazansky. Ahead, his F-18 waggled its wings, slow and graceful. Moonlight glinted from the smooth curves of its bodywork. "What's it looking like?"

The radio showed a long wave transmission. Another one. The military wavelengths started to appear, sparse and flicking, but still there. Still transmitting. Civilian broadcasts began to cluster at the lower end of the dial. There were active radar warnings. Primary and secondary airport surveillance radar transmissions. The F-18's computer began to reply to pings from bases in Israel, and a Saudi airfield transmitting USAF recognition codes. 

"I dunno," Maverick said. He touched the compass in his pocket, smiling. "But it's looking good so far."

**Author's Note:**

> The description of ditching a helicopter alongside a carrier draws on the incredibly courageous actions of Vietnamese pilot [Ba Van Nguyen](https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/south-vietnamese-pilot-stole-a-chinook.html).


End file.
